...And this is Love...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06khEqzGEsc

Most people think that sharing the love of God starts with telling people that God loves them. That is true, perhaps, for the small percentage of people who grow up in functional and loving home environments. For the other 99.9% of the world, however, it has to start far before that point. Sharing the Gospel of Christ to those individuals must start with first helping the individual understand what love is and that he/she can actually BE loved by someone.

Most of my life, I heard all about God’s love and Jesus’ sacrifice, and I believed it all, but there was a part of me that never really believed it in reference to myself. This was not out of defiance or disobedience or unwillingness to commit or surrender my life. No, I WANTED God’s love. I WANTED to follow Jesus. I just didn’t think it was possible for me. I THOUGHT I understood love- I mean, I thought that some of what I’d seen other people lived in the midst of was love, but I certainly didn’t really understand how I could be loved. …And, it wasn’t simply because I had a ‘low self-esteem’ either. It basically boiled down to the fact that I, unfortunately, was part of that larger percentage for whom the Gospel of Christ had to back-track before penetrating the heart.

I spent the first 20 years of my life pushing my dad away from me. He was so abusive to most people he knew, my family included. His love toward them was conditional and ever-changing, completely unstable and unpredictable- living with him was like living in a war zone where you never knew what bomb might drop or upon which mine you may step. It was easier; therefore, to hate him. That way he couldn’t hurt me. Someone can’t hurt you by not loving you if you hate him/her first, right? Well, that would work, I suppose, if I didn’t have to care an extremely amount in some form or fashion about my father to begin even conjuring up the ‘hateful’ emotions. I may have acted like I didn’t care to have his love, but that was only because I really did. We are built with, designed with, a need for love and definition and fulfillment, to be known and to commune. That’s how it was intended by God. Adam and Eve were perfectly loved by God and lived in communion with Him, fully knowing Him, fully knowing one another, living without shame and loving. Then….sin entered…..a choice taken after a lie believed. Forever the communion was tainted, forever the ‘being known’ bruised by the serpent. It seems since then, we’ve all been trying to figure out where to get the love and the fulfillment…and what exactly it really looks like.

Unfortunately, most people only end up reinforcing bad examples of love. We are all sinful human beings. We don’t understand how to love our brothers and sisters anymore, even when we want to. Regrettably, Dad’s example of love was reinforced to me over and over again until I just started to expect it- disappointment that is and broken relationships. More often I entered new relationships of any type awaiting the tragic end, the tragic betrayal, the tragic revelation that I could not meet his/her standards. The tragic end, interestingly enough, always came. Sure, at times one may be correct in seeing that I created my own self-fulfilled prophecy, but more often than not, Satan just enjoyed using the sin of others to reinforce the lies about love that I had always seen.

Tell someone like me, then, that God loves them, and it doesn’t make much sense. “Why would God love me? My dad couldn’t, and certainly my dad’s standards are lower than God’s, right?” …or…. “Ok, so God loves me, but from what I understand of love, it’s a scary thing. Perfect love casts out all fear? Well then, I certainly have no idea of what perfect love is.”

Thankfully, God is long-suffering and patient. He doesn’t give up. I will never forget the day that I sat in my floor sobbing over my sin and all the walls that seemingly had been put up around me. It was like God was fencing me in….love was no where to be found… I couldn’t get it any way that I tried. The only option left was ‘God,’ but I didn’t understand why, if God loved me, He wouldn’t let me have all the things that I thought would make me feel loved….all the ones I wanted to love me. I felt sinful and dirty that I couldn’t just be content on God’s love and believe it…and that I CERTAINLY did not feel it, but then again, I’d never FELT loved…what did FEELING love feel like? I hadn’t a clue.

And then it hit me….THAT is what Jesus died for….even my inability to understand….even my sin- even everyone else’s sin….even my running from God….even my attempts at finding love outside of Him…THAT is what HE died for- to atone for all that AND to make a way that I might KNOW what LOVE was SUPPOSED to be BEFORE all the sin entered. I wept, tears of joy and relief…but tears nonetheless.

I wish I could say that since that day I have not felt that I needed the love of others or approval of others to feel complete. I wish I could say that since that day I have not pushed someone away out of fear that they are going to hurt me. I’ve done all those things since that day, and there are definitely times I still struggle to understand what it means that God loves me…and I know there are deep, deep wounds from childhood that God is still healing. If not, I wouldn’t be crying even as I write this. I can tell it when small things bring up hurts that I’d forgotten- It’s a hard and scary game, to let God show them to me, and then to grieve them…. but I am amazed how God seems to have a purpose in each rooted out hurt, in each tear. It’s like he uses it all as fuel for ministry.

I must say, sometimes I wish I could just bundle up with God (and perhaps my pets) and not have to face the fear of physical hurt that Satan, uncertainty, the unknown, past memories, and people can inflict upon me. It would be easier to live life if I didn’t have to trust other people…if it could just be me and God. But I can’t- because in me…in my heart…. the Holy Spirit lifts me and calls to me to open up my arms - to hold the countless young people just like me… to explain the Gospel by starting with what LOVE IS and with the fact that just because no one else has loved them DOES NOT MEAN they can’t be loved…. and does not mean that GOD HIMSELF doesn’t love them dearly.

And what is more, I am thankful that it’s a lesson I had to learn because who wants to hear about this truth from someone who hasn’t really experienced it? I guess that’s why I feel the burden to sit with those who can’t trust me and continue to tell them God loves them and isn’t leaving them….and that I’m not either. I feel that burden because it’s what I needed to hear, what I still have to hear from time to time. If ever I’ve pushed you away, be patient. I’m learning to trust. Only recently did I learn what love is and that God loves me… Most of us spend our lives feeling forsaken. It’s Satan’s greatest victory… but God crushes the serpent’s head through the Love of Christ. We may be cast down, but we are not forsaken. Jesus was forsaken so that we might never be. THAT is what love is…

So here are the statistics from a meeting I went to last week- I’d have to say, these stats are the evidence that children are searching for, seeking, in need of ….love…. and that they just can’t find it. Jesus, introduce yourself to them….and use me however you so desire!

• 10 million students are abusing drugs and alcohol
• 65% of students admit to being sexually active by 12^th grade
• 14% admit to having 4 or more partners
  
• 8,000 kids a day contract an STD
• 90% of 8 to 16 year olds have viewed pornography
• Suicide is the 3^rd leading cause of death among adolescents and teens
• 90% of adolescents and teens admit to feeling UNLOVED and wishing they were someone else
• 92% confess to having an unmet need to feel secure, trusted and love…and that they don’t get it from home
• 50% of teachers were assaulted by students in the last year
• 83% of students say they base moral truth upon circumstance

“Don’t you know I’ve always loved you…even before there was time….and though you turn away, I tell you still…Don’t you know I’ve always loved you…and I always will…”

My God, penetrate our hearts and minds with the reality of Your Love, amen.